The present invention relates to a liquid ejecting apparatus and a cleaning method thereof, particularly, relates to a liquid ejecting apparatus in which a liquid ejecting head is mounted on a carriage, and the liquid ejecting head ejects a liquid to a target by moving the carriage relative to the target and a cleaning method for cleaning the liquid ejecting apparatus.
For example, there is an ink jet type printer for printing by ejecting a plurality of ink drops as an apparatus for ejecting an extremely small amount of a liquid to a target. The printer of this kind is provided with a recording head formed with a plurality of nozzles each having a very small opening portion and each ink drop is ejected from the opening portion of each nozzle. Further, the printer is provided with a wiping member for maintenance cleaning. In finishing the maintenance cleaning, the wiping member slides on a lower face of the recording head so that ink adhered to the opening portion of the nozzle and a surrounding thereof is wiped, extra ink adhered to the lower face is removed, and a meniscus of ink at a front end portion of the nozzle is regulated.
However, the wiping member is ordinarily constituted by an elastic member. The wiping member is bent (in order to sufficiently remove ink) when sliding on the opening portion of the nozzle. Therefore, when the wiping member wipes the opening portion of the nozzle and is moved away from the recording head, the wiping member rapidly restores by a restoring force thereof. That is, when the wiping member restores from a bent state, ink adhered to a front end of the wiping member scatters to the surrounding by the restoring operation so as to contaminate the surrounding, that is, an inner side of the printer.
Also, in order to reduce contamination by ink scattered from the front end of the wiping member, there is emerged a printer provided with an inclined plate for restoring the wiping member which has wiped the recording head gradually to an original shape at a carriage. That is, the inclined plate has an inclined face. The wiping member gradually restores to the original shape along the inclined face and therefore, scattering of ink can be reduced.
However, the inclined plate is attached to the carriage at a clearance from the recording head to facilitate integration thereof. When the wiping member restores to the original shape is a case in which the front end of the wiping member is brought into the clearance, ink is scattered to the clearance between the inclined plate and the recording head over a wide range. Hence, when the clearance is narrowed such that the wiping member is prevented from being brought between the inclined plate and the recording head, in this case, since the clearance is narrow, capillary force is operated, ink invaded to the clearance by movement of the wiping member is conducted to an upper portion, for example, conducted to other portion of a board of the printer or the like to thereby bring about a drawback.